The machine-to-machine communications (Machine-to-Machine Communications, M2M) is a type of networked application and service with machine-to-machine intelligent interactions being the core. The M2M communications implements data communications without human intervention by embedding wireless or wired communication modules and application processing logic in machines, so as to satisfy user's informatization requirements in the aspects such as detecting, directing and dispatching, and data collection and measurement. A conventional M2M system architecture includes M2M terminals, an M2M gateway, an M2M service platform, and an M2M application platform, where the M2M terminals may be a sensor, a microcontroller, and the like. The M2M terminals are connected to the M2M gateway by using the technology of stub sensor network (for example, the ZigBee and the BlueTooth) and further connected to the M2M service platform through the M2M gateway using a remote access technology (for example, a 2G/3G wireless cellular network). Moreover, all types of M2M application platform (for example, electric meter reading and intelligent traffic) acquire, through the M2M service platform, data collected by the M2M terminals, or remotely control and manage the M2M terminals in a sensor network.
The management of a remote device is an important function of an M2M system, that is, the M2M application platform or an M2M service provider is required to perform daily management and maintenance of the M2M terminals in the stub sensor network remotely through the M2M service platform and the M2M gateway. Because the stub sensor network generally performs networking in a self-organized manner, sometimes, it is difficult to predict a network topology and a working status of a device. Therefore, an administrator needs to discover a topology to adjust the topology. The topology discovery is to find which devices are contained in the sensor network and the communication connection relationships among the devices through a remote network topology management function. The topology adjustment is to perform proper manual adjustment when necessary.
In the prior art, remote device management technologies based on a wide area network mainly include the device management (Device Management, DM) regulations defined by the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA). The technology can implement remote management for the M2M gateway through operating management object (Management Object, MO) data on the M2M gateway, but still does not support remote topology management for a stub sensor network through the M2M gateway. In another aspect, in the field of sensor networks, the ZigBee gateway device regulations define a technology of remote network management based on an Internet protocol (Internet Protocol, IP) bearer. The technology can provide a simple remote ZigBee network device and an operation method for service discovery rather than directly provide topology information of the sensor network and a topology adjustment method. The above function can only be implemented by further combining other ZigBee management commands, where the operation method is complicated. Other sensor network protocols (for example, the BlueTooth) do not provide a method for remotely managing a topology through a gateway.